Between two friends
by JeaTea
Summary: Before the Washington sisters disappeared at the beginning of 2014, there was a party, if less tragic not without its own effect. This is my first time publishing a story, so I hope you ll enjoy it. Constructive criticism is more than welcome! 3


**Friday 4th October 2013**

"Ughh, I'm sooo hungry!" Hannah let herself fall on the cream coloured couch in the middle of their living room. Half an hour ago she came back from her tennis practice, had showered and changed clothes, and now her last meal was approximately 6 hours ago, no possibility to snack in between.

She looked at her sister Beth, who sat at the kitchen counter, in front of her laptop, probably writing an essay due next week.

"Shouldn't sports like...minimize your appetite?", Josh asked jokingly, a half grin on his face. He sat next to Hannah on the couch watching TV, some random sitcom.

"Shut up, I'm hungry okay?" Hannah had _that_ tone to her voice, where you instantly forgive that she was slightly mean to you. Not that this happened regularly anyway.

"The others should be here soon, do you think they´ll mind if we order already? I just can't think unless I know there's food on the way."

Josh shrugged. "Sure, go ahead."

Hannah pondered her decision. "Pizza is a classic, what do you say Beth?"

"Hmm?" Her younger sister looked up from her laptop, clearly not following the conversation.

"I think Beth would prefer to eat asian." Casually, Josh whipped out his phone to let his sentence sink in.

"Oh my god Josh, you're so disgusting!" Nevertheless, Hannah couldn't help but giggle a bit.

Beth blushed a little and stood up.

"You two are despicable", she uttered in a perfect british accent, she liked to put on.

Both of them sheepishly looked down, Hannah more so than Josh.

"Let's get pizza, alright? You order it and I'll get the booze ready." Even though Beth was the younger sister, she surprisingly showed higher levels of organization and her older sister followed the given instructions.

Closing her laptop, Beth sighed and thought about the possible events of tonight.

Matt had a football game he couldn't miss, Jess was in a "crying all day every day and eating 5 Twix for breakfast" phase, because her scumbag boyfriend had cheated on her again and Ashley...To be honest Beth didn't care that much for Ashley and why she wouldn't come tonight, she was kind of an addition to Chris, she rarely spoke in a group setting anyway. Sam, Chris, Mike and Emily had agreed to come.

Yesterday, she and Josh had prepared the guest room, making room for four people to sleep in relatively comfortable.

When they were midway through, he asked her about Emily. A week ago or so Hannah had catched her staring at a picture of her. And Hannah sure as hell couldn't keep a secret.

So Beth told her brother about it. How she wanted Em to still be her friend, she didn't want to make a move on her and possibly ruin their friendship. No matter what, she didn't want things to change.

Josh seemed to understand that and Beth had her theories why.

She didn't know what exactly had happened, but sometime a few months back her admiration for Em became a bit more than what she had experienced in other friendships. But she wasn't in love! It was just a bit of a crush, nothing more and nothing less. It would die down soon enough, like her crushes always did. She just needed to remind herself that Em had a boyfriend. No chances.

"Alright, here we are!" Mike operated the handbrake and his car came to a halt near the almost gigantic house that was the Washington home.

It sometimes intimidated Em a tiny bit.

But then she shook the thoughts off, turned to Mike and gave him a small peck on the lips.

This week had been so good to Em´s ego, she had gotten two A´s on her latest tests and another professor explicitly praised her essay in front of the whole class. She wanted to party, keep this high and not come back down that easily like she normally would.

And her amazing, hot boyfriend was here as well, all was good.

Em smiled and stepped out of the car.

A few hours later, the pizzas were eaten up and the hosts as well as their guests were pretty drunk. With the exception of Sam, who was hydrating in between the shots and had accepted her fate as the mom of the group.

Em felt like she was in a happy daze, her cheeks blushed from the beer. Her eyes closed, she moved her body in tune with the music, that was way too loud.

From a safe spot on the couch, Beth had an eye on her, she tried to keep it casual, but her brain felt too fogged up to properly define "casual".

"Guys, you wanna know what would be so awesome right now?" From a distance Beth and Em heard Josh speak in his usual drunk voice, which sounded more childish than anything else.

"Sure." Chris tried to place his bum on the couch next to Beth, but failed and landed opposite Em. A small chuckle was the response from everyone. "Oh man…", he mumbled and hoped that no one could detect his actual pain.

"How about some "Truth or Dare"?" With a grin Josh looked at his younger sister Beth.

She could feel that this would be a bad idea, but seeing as everybody else went along with it, she didn't really have a choice.

Slowly but surely, the group assembled into a circle on the floor. It felt so nostalgic, Beth wanted to pull out her old middle school uniform.

"Who wants to start then?" Josh expectantly looked into the round.

"How about you?" Mike chuckled. Wodka Orange was never and would never be his friend. He got drunk so much faster and later regretted every sip of it, as he didn't realize once he had pushed his limits, just kept going and in the morning having hangovers, one worse than the other.

Josh nodded.

"Truth or Dare?" The others audibly sucked in air to increase the dramatic moment.

"Truth. I ain´t got nothin´ to hide." He avoided looking into Sam's general direction.

"Were you ever in love with someone from our group, present or not."

The others "ohhh"ed and "aaaahhh"ed for a few moments.

"Yes." _Don't look at Sam, don't look at Sam, don't look…_

The "oooh"s grew louder than the first time around.

"Alright, alright, next person!" Josh managed to get out pretty easily, but not without blushing thoroughly.

The next person turned out to be Chris, who had to lick the living room carpet and then it was Mike´s turn. With his usual charisma, if not amplified through the alcohol, he recounted the beautiful tale of how he lost his virginity ("and this wasn't Em"). Hannah looked like she wanted to be sick and kept looking in the direction of their bathroom. She definitely couldn't handle much and this on top seemed a bit too much. Somehow though, she kept it together.

Then it was Em´s turn.

"Guess I'll pick "dare", right?" She felt slightly dizzy.

"Alright Em, I want you to kiss Beth on the mouth for at least three seconds."

 _Wait, what?_ , thought both girls.

Josh held back a smile and Hannah tried her hardest not to bump her elbow into her sister's arm repeatedly.

"Honey, what?" Em wasn't opposed to the idea, she had kissed Sam once before when they were in 8th grade, it was their first time being drunk and drunk they were, Em had a complete blackout of that night, the others told her about the kiss the morning afterwards. The panic of her parents finding out and disowning her was almost worse than the hangover. Almost.

She just didn't think Mike would be cool with it. Okay, he was pretty drunk and seemed extremely happy with his suggest, so what could it do?

"Come on Mike, Em is your girlfriend!" Sam, the most sober out of all of them, seemed concerned.

"Pfff S-Sammy, calm down!" Clumsily, Em got on her hands and knees and leaned forwards, her face close to touching Beth's face.

The heart rate of both girls picked up a bit.

 _Just a little crush_ , thought Beth.

Em came closer. _Just a little…_

Their lips touched. _Just a…_

A tickling feeling went down her spine, as the others began to count.

"Three…" Em´s lips on hers, warm and soft, slightly sticky from that lipgloss she loved to use.

 _Wha-t?_ Em´s mind seemed to go into too many directions, some of which she wasn't sure whether she wanted it to.

"Two…"

Suddenly, the room felt a lot warmer for the two of them. Even with their eyes closed, they could feel the others stare.

 _Just forget about them_ , Em tried to convey to Beth and was surprised about this thought.

"One…"

Beth could feel Em pulling her closer for the last moment and wasn't sure how to react.

 _What the hell am I doing?_ As fogged up as her brain felt, Em could still detect that she was… enjoying this?

"Zero…"

Beth pulled out of the kiss, which she probably wouldn't have if the circumstances were different.

Em opened her eyes and saw Beth looking directly into her eyes.

 _Was this alright with you?_ The gaze seemed to say and Em looked away.

"Okay, let's change the music up in here!" Josh got up and waddled over.

Suddenly, the boxes blared "I kissed a girl" and he giggled like a little child.

"Josh, you're such a weirdo!" Hannah lightly punched her brother in his side.

"Owww!"

"...and I liked iiiit!" Katy Perry sounded not at all fazed, while Em felt like hiding under her blanket.

But since that was not an option available right now, she settled for the second best alternative.

If she couldn't change what had happened, she could forget about it.

Em grabbed a shot glass and the Tequila.

The room and the walls around her seemed to spin, an air hammer may have found its way into her brain. A short glance on her phone confirmed that it was later than Em had hoped it would be. Also, Jess had texted her, asking about the party. Needless to say, Em wasn't really in the mood to answer her.

She massaged her forehead, hoping that this would somehow ease the pain a bit.

Nothing.

With quite a bit of effort, Em got up from the couch and tried to walk to the kitchen in a relatively steady line.

Chris, who sat next to her seemed to have fallen asleep, Sam was probably still taking care of Hannah, who already showed signs of near vomiting when Em last saw her. When was that?

Emily turned around and saw Mike and Josh talking about something in a drunk, excited way.

 _And where is Beth?_ Em asked herself and immediately regretted this thought.

Anyway, she had far too much alcohol swimming around in her body, she needed some water.

So she walked into the kitchen and halfway through her plan, she realized, that she had never helped herself to a glass of water at the Washington´s house before. Obviously she knew where the things she needed were, but it felt a bit wrong to do it all on her own.

Eventually, she had her glass of water in her hand, took a few sips and waited for the airhammer to take it down a notch.

"Heeeayyy Em" Beth came stumbling towards her. Em recognized that it was one of the rare times Beth let herself go and drank way too much.

A slight panic settled inside of Em and her heart rate rose up inexplicably.

 _Calm down again, come on!_ Em´s mind seemed to make more and more excuses for what her body did.

"Juss´ wanted to say that this...kissss" Beth giggled. "Y´know nothing special, happpens…"

For some reason Em wanted to disappear out of this situation and just go back to normal. She couldn't wait until her hangover would be over.

"S-sure, Beth", her voice sounded quieter and sadder than she planned. _Get out, get out now!_

Em made her way around Beth and walked towards the living room.

"But like…"

Em faced Beth again and put down her half-emptied glass.

"I don't want peeeooople to staaaare at meee."

A tiny smile flushed up on Em´s lips.

"Yeah, same here."

"Y´knooow, we're here alone now..." Beth made a step towards Em, who felt her cheeks flush again and shyly looked to the ground.

"Oh my gooood, ´m so drunk!" Once again Beth laughed, relieving the Em´s tension.

"Come on, drink some water" Now that Beth was here with her, she didn't feel that weird about fetching a glass from the immaculate cupboard.

"Here!" Em handed her friend the water glass.

"Thanks." She pretty much downed the whole thing. Of course it didn't make a huge improvement on the spot, but Beth felt slightly better.

"Yoouu are such a cutie." For some reason Beth closed her eyes for a few seconds, making enough time for Em to get closer to her, brushing a strand of hair behind her ear.

She didn't know why she was doing this.

"Wha-what are you doing?" Her heart started racing again, Beth tried to think of something to slow it down again. _This is not happening_ , she told herself.

"I don't know." Usually, Em didn't like to be frank about her feelings. But it was an ungodly hour at a friend's place, she was drunk and talking to the girl she had kissed earlier and here they were.

"I guess... ughh, why is this so hard?" Em looked at Beth searching for an answer, even though she knew her friend didn't have it.

"I´ve never really experienced this before and… I-I don't know how to handle it right now…"

"Oh Em. I mean..I'm… definitely too drunk to give, you know... advice, buuuut... you´ll figure it out."

That was the answer Emily needed to hear. But not exactly the answer she wanted.

Beth went in for a hug and her body so close to hers, made her heart skip a beat.

As she was pulling Em closer to her, Beth asked herself if this was just her crush acting out or genuine concern for her friend. Being drunk didn't help her come to a conclusion.

So she drew back out of the hug.

Wide-eyed, Em looked at her, her lips, the air cooling her body in the places Beth was a few moments ago.

 _Please… I want to…_

Beth saw her friend beam at her and then felt a sudden rush when she was pulled close to her and suddenly Em´s lips were on hers again.

 _Let me have this for one moment_ , thought Emily. _I can go back to being confused in a few minutes._

Almost trembling, Beth put her hand around her waist, making its way up her back, unknowingly causing waves of shivers, leaving Em´s skin with goosebumps.

Their lips were slightly open when touching each other, so slowly, Em´s tongue began to make its way into Beth's mouth, their tongues then touching. Em bumped into the kitchen counter.

 _Can´t believe this is happening, oh my god…_ Beth questioned her senses, letting the hand wander up again and come to a halt at Em´s neck and moved her head closer to her own.

 _What am I doing, I'm only making it worse_ , but Em found herself unable to stop. Beth's soft hand on her neck…

 _EM, Stop!_ As sudden as she had thrown herself on Beth, as sudden did she withdraw her whole body.

"I'm sorry, I just…" Em looked at her feet and then up at her friend. Her friend that she had just kissed for the second time this evening. Her friend that had her tongue inside of her just now. That friend.

While they were still close to each other, they saw Chris suddenly standing in the doorframe.

Both of the girls looked kind of shocked for a moment and would it have been any other person, they would´ve been asked what was going on. But because it was Chris, he didn't seem too bothered by it, the information of what he had seen probably not properly sent through his system.

"Errr, I'm sorry, gonna go now..."

And with that, he stumbled out backwards, closing the kitchen door right in front of him.

"Fuck…" Pushing herself away from the kitchen counter, Em thought about what to do next.

Would he remember this? Would he tell Mike? Up until now Em felt like she was in the middle of a haze, not being able to see clearly and everything felt seemingly unreal. Chris had just brought her straight back to reality. And it hurt.

"Emmy, I'm tired…" Beth let her head fall on Em´s shoulder. Every touch sent a shiver down her body, even though she didn't want it to.

"Come on, let's get you to the couch"

Putting an arm around her, Em supported her friend out of the kitchen and helped her lie down. Out of the corners of her eyes, she registered that Mike and Josh had crashed face down into the table in front of them.

"Nightie night." Beth had her eyes closed and Em was sitting down next to her for a bit, not knowing where else to go.

Certainly she couldn't lie down next to Mike tonight. Em looked on her phone to check the time. It was about seven o´clock.

Em got up, threw a last glance at Beth and then went to the guest room. With maximum effort she tried to gather her stuff as quiet as possible.

Apparently, Chris had already gone back to sleep, his snoring sounding steadily.

"Em...?" Sam's tired voice got to her. She had a light sleep and she woke up pretty much every day at 6.30 to go for a jog anyway.

"Sssshhh, go back to sleep!" Finally, Em had found everything she needed and desperately wanted to get out of this room and house.

"Wait- where are you going?"

Em sighed. _I need to say something…_

"Let's talk outside, okay?"

"Sure." Sam pushed herself up from the big mattress she shared with Chris and followed Emily to the front door. Sam grabbed the house key out of habit, they closed the door behind them and sat down on the stairs in front of the house.

"So, what's going on?" Despite having walked a couple of steps, Sam still was pretty sleepy.

Em wanted to hide her face, but she couldn't. Instead she tried not to look at her friend.

"I...I kissed Beth…", she pressed out, using the minimum of words, otherwise she would have just exploded.

"Yeah, I know, when we played "truth or dare", what about it?"

Em wanted to roll herself down the stairs and immediately disappear.

"No, I kissed her again, what the fuck is wrong with me?" Starting to cry, Em put her arms around her knees, resting her head on top of them, facing away from Sam.

"Oh man…" Sam didn't know how else to react. Five minutes ago she was still asleep.

"Come on Em, we'll figure this out, I mean…" If she was honest, she didn't really know what to do, or at least yet.

"You're going to stay ´til morning, right?" Em felt the strong urge to leave and forget what had happened at this house tonight. She wiped her tears away.

"Well, technically it already is the morning..." Sam pointed towards the slowly rising sun.

"Can you try and find out whether she remembers this and just text me about it." With her overnight bag in her hand, Em got up.

"Yeah, I'll do that…" Even though she wasn't sure if this was the correct way to handle the situation.

Emily made a few steps away from the house, when Sam called her back.

"But… are you not going to talk about this with her? With Mike?"

Those were the things Em wanted to desperately leave behind and even though she appreciated Sam's outspokenness most of the time, it could be a real pain in the ass.

"If she remembers I will. And I'll see about Mike…"

Sam bit her lip and swallowed her thoughts.

"I really need to go now, I can´t stand being here much longer." Em shuffled around nervously.

"I'll see you soon, alright?" And with that Em turned around and walked away.

"See you soon." Sam felt confused. Em would rarely show herself this vulnerable and even if she did, her next slightly bitchy remark made you forget it..

 _Man, I´ve never really seen her like this before..._ , thought Sam and opened the front door.

She went back to the guest room and tried to get some more sleep.

Em decided to call for a taxi, a few streets away.

When it arrived, the driver had a hard time not to ask her about her night.

Practically a teenager alone on an early Saturday morning.

Em sat down on the back seat and stared out of the window. Why did she feel so scared?

It wasn't Mike she was worried about or her friendship with Beth.

 _She_ had kissed her. No "Truth or Dare" or "Spin the bottle" or any other pubescent shit. Her own decision. Her own _feelings_?

She knew that she didn't have a crush on Beth. But it had still felt _good_.

After that one time in 8th grade Emily had never kissed a girl again and just focused on school and crushes on boys. Could it be that...

Emily pushed her thoughts away.

When she woke up, the room seemed to spin around Beth.

She felt really ill.

After she had thrown up into the guest toilet, she came into the living room to Sam sitting on the couch, reading a book she brought.

"What are you reading?" Beth tried to sound casual.

"Just some uni stuff, nothing important." Closing the book and setting it on the table in front of her, Sam turned her body towards Beth.

"How are you feeling?", Sam asked, concerned.

"Ermm, not too great, as you could tell." Beth cackled a little. "God, I must have been really drunk, I can't remember much…"

She tried to collect her memories.

The music, the hazy feel of being drunk, then she recalled playing "Truth or Dare".

 _Did that really happen? Does Em remember?_

After that, black.

"Man, can't remember anything after "Truth or Dare"." Beth tried to say as laid-back as possible..

"Maybe try to drink a bit less next time?" Sam didn't know whether she should feel relieved or worried that Beth didn't remember the second kiss.

"Sure, Mom."

The both girls laughed.

"I'm gonna go get something to drink", Beth stated. "Water of course!"

She went into the kitchen and saw the utter mess that they had left there.

After she had poured herself a drink, she leaned on the kitchen counter and found a small memory popping up.

Em and her talking in the kitchen? She couldn't figure out what they were saying, she just saw Em´s face in front of her. Worried, ashamed?

Nothing before that, nothing after.


End file.
